1. Field of the Invention
The present invention pertains to a method and an apparatus for the making of packages or analogous containers for the reception of material. More particularly, it pertains to a method and apparatus for automatically and continuously forming completely sealed packages with fin type seals for material, such as cigarettes, cigars, pipe tobacco, or the like.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the tobacco industry, it is a conventional practice to sell and store groups of cigarettes or the like in packages. Each grouping of cigarettes normally consists of twenty cigarettes in the customary array, namely, two outer layers of seven with a median layer containing six. Typical prior art packages for such a grouping of cigarettes are basically constituted by several components, for example, an envelope of paper backed aluminum foil, a wrapped envelope of paper, plastic, or cardboard label, and an overwrap of cellophane material or the like, with the conventional tear strip.
Generally described, heretofore known automatic wrapping machines for forming and filling such prior art cigarette packages basically perform the steps of converting blanks of material, such as a paper backed aluminum foil and paper label into an empty package, filling the package with the aforementioned cigarette grouping, and then closing the filled packages. Specifically, these types of machines feed a paper backed aluminum foil to a rotatably indexed turret which carries a plurality of discrete and circumferentially spaced forming arbors or mandrels. The fed paper backed aluminum foil is wrapped about the mandrel in such a manner that it is folded and tucked to conform to the shape of the mandrel and then is glue sealed along the side and bottom. Thereafter, a paper label is appropriately wrapped over the folded aluminum foil. After the package has been thusly formed, the grouping of 20 cigarettes are inserted into the open top end thereof. Subsequently, the top is folded, tucked, and then held in place by a glued strip of paper across the folded top of the pack.
Such prior art packages as used in the tobacco industry as well as the apparatus and method for forming the same, however, are not adapted to provide for a completely hermetically sealed enclosure. As a consequence, such packages, for example, do not adequately retain the moisture of the tobacco. Accordingly, cigarettes, for instance, would have a tendency to lose their freshness. Moreover, in certain environments, the cigarettes, whenever stored in such packages, are also subject to the possibility of insect infestation. As can, therefore, be readily appreciated, conventionally wrapped cigarette packages are not as effective in completely sealing the cigarettes as they could otherwise be.